How supervisors craft their own job and facilitate employees´ job crafting
ROMY E.M. BREUKERS S0155330
Master Thesis Communication Studies, Universiteit Twente Saasveld, 20 October 2014
Tutor 1: Dr. M. van Vuuren Tutor 2: Dr. J.J. van Hoof
Summary This research provides insight into how supervisors craft their own job and how supervisors facilitate employees’ job crafting. A qualitative study of 23 supervisors and 20 employees in a waste management organization is utilized. The findings of this study suggest that besides employees, supervisors craft their own job as well.
Different efforts and techniques supervisors use are identified. By stimulating
supervisors’ job crafting, supervisors’ job satisfaction can be increased. In employees´
job crafting, supervisors have a relevant role because of the degrees of freedom.
Although in former studies the degrees of freedom was seen as a given fact, this study identified four levels: invite, allow, discourage and block. Besides, supervisors who are satisfied about their own job will facilitate employees’ job crafting more frequently than hinder employees’ job crafting. Supervisors increase employees’
well-being by invite and allow employees’ job crafting and decrease employees’ well- being by discourage and block employees’ job crafting. Hence this study is innovative with new concepts of job crafting, facilitate job crafting and well-being.
2
Introduction
As long as people work, they have changed components in their jobs in order to improve their physical and mental well-being and their job satisfaction (Slemp & Vella-Brogdrick, 2014). For a long time researchers neglected these employee-initiated changes. Most research was about the job design initiated by the supervisor (Berg, Grant & Johnson, 2010). In 2001 the scholars Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) recognized the concept where employees change their job, and titled this as job crafting. Job crafting is a proactive behaviour of employees by changing components of their job without discussing with the supervisor. Although all research about job crafting focus on employees in general, Berg, Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2010) made a distinction between employees in high- ranking jobs and employees in low-ranking jobs. Employees in high-ranking jobs (supervisors) as well as employees in low-ranking jobs craft their job. Hence, this research suggests that both employees and supervisors craft their job (Berg, Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2010). In order to craft their job employees need a ‘degree of freedom’ given by their supervisor. This degree of freedom determines the extent of employees’ job crafting. Hence, the supervisor is seen as a boundary condition in employees’ job crafting (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001).
What seems to be lacking in job crafting research is the role of the supervisor in employees’ job crafting. The model (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001) suggests that supervisors serve as a boundary condition, since “managerial supervision” (together with “task interdependence”) determines the degrees of freedom available. However, while job crafting is an initiative from employees,
supervisors may facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting. In the current literature the degree of this facilitation is seen as an established fact. Insight is lacking in the way managerial supervision in relation to job crafting gets established. Therefore, the goal of this study is to provide insight into 1) supervisors’ own job crafting efforts, 2) the extent to which supervisors facilitate job crafting of their employees.
Job crafting
For a long time scholars have used the design of jobs as a starting point to examine how employees experience their job (Berg, Grant & Johnson, 2010). The Job Design Theory (SDT) is about the top- down process where supervisors design the content of the job and select employees with the required knowledge, skills and competences for this job (Tims & Bakker, 2010). When a job is designed and the right employee is selected, the employee will re-design his job slowly to match or fit the job with his own capacities and preferences. These changes will be discussed with and noticed by the supervisors (Tims & Bakker, 2010).
3 As long as people work, they have changed components in their job in order to fit the job with their capacities and preferences and to improve their physical and mental well-being and job satisfaction (Tims & Bakker, 2010; Slemp & Vella-Brogdrick, 2014). For a long time researchers neglected these employee-initiated changes. In 2001, Wrzesniewski & Dutton (2001) recognized this and titled this concept as job crafting. These scholars have add the classical top-down view of job design with the concept of job crafting, focused on the proactive, bottom-up way in which employees change their job (Berg, Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2010). In contrast to re-design, in the concept of job crafting employee-initiated changes are not discussed with the supervisor and are not noticed by the supervisor. Hence job crafting is not a ‘prescribed behaviour’ but a proactive behaviour of the employee without permission of the supervisor (Tims & Bakker, 2010).
Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) describe job crafting as “the physical and cognitive changes individuals make in the task and relational boundaries of their work”. Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) divide three forms of job crafting: changing physical task boundaries, changing cognitive task boundaries and changing relational boundaries. Changing physical task boundaries, task crafting, implies that employees change their job by doing different, fewer or more tasks. Changing cognitive task boundaries, cognitive crafting, implies how an employee thinks about or ‘sees’ his job. Changing relational boundaries, relational crafting, refers to the amount and quality of relationships and interactions an employee has in their job (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). Besides these three forms of job crafting, a fourth form of job crafting is recognized: contextual crafting. Contextual crafting refers to changing the work place or work environment (Dorenbosch, Gründemann and Sanders, 2011). Hence job crafting is the activity in which employees actively craft their job by changing cognitive, task, relational and/or contextual boundaries (Berg, Dutton & Wrzesniewski, 2008). Berg, Grant and Johnson (2010) identified three techniques employees use to craft their job. The first technique is task emphasizing, by allocating more time, attention and energy to tasks related to the unanswered calling. The second technique is job expanding, whereby new tasks or projects are added, related to the unanswered calling. The third technique is role reframing, which means mentally connections between the purpose of the current role of an employee and an unanswered calling (Berg, Grant & Johnson, 2010). Van Vuuren and Dorenbosch (2011) identified sixteen different job crafting techniques. These techniques are divided into the four forms of crafting (task crafting, relational crafting, cognitive crafting and context crafting) and four crafting directions
(complementing, changing, pushing off and solving) (van Vuuren & Dorenbosch, 2011). With these small changes, employees align the job more to their own needs and competences (Wrzesniewski &
Dutton, 2001).
4 Employees have different needs to fulfil. Because of these different needs, employees have different motives to craft their job. Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) identified three motives why people craft their job. Employees craft their job to claim some control about the job and to avoid alienation from their job. People like to have control about their job and have the drive to make it their own. Second, employees craft their job to create a positive self-image. When the job does not create a positive self-image sufficiently, people are motivated to change this. Third, employees craft their job to fulfil a basic human need for connection with other people. This basic human need for connection can be an important influence of employees’ relationships in the job (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). When employees feel that their needs are not met or fulfilled, most often it will result in motivation to craft the job. Besides, motivation to craft the job is more likely when employees perceive that
opportunities for job crafting exist (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) identified two contributors to the perceived opportunities to craft the job, 1) the task interdependence and 2) the managerial supervision. Task interdependence refers to the extent to which job elements or tasks are interrelated to other people. Therefore, changes in these elements or tasks will affect other people. When employees have more task interdependence in the job, they have less freedom to change the tasks and relationships in their job. Hence the more task
interdependence an employee has, the fewer degrees of freedom the employee has to craft the job (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). The managerial supervision refers to the extent to which
supervisors control employees’ tasks and time. The more employees are controlled by their supervisors, the fewer degrees of freedom supervisors give to the employee to craft the job (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). Hence Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) pretend that “autonomy in the job leads to perceived opportunities for job crafting and encourages employees to alter the task and relational boundaries of their jobs”. Berg, Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2010) suggest that there is a difference in perceiving this autonomy by employees in high-ranking jobs (managers and supervisors) and employees in low-ranking jobs. They discovered that employees at high-ranking job feel more constrained to craft their job, while employees at low-ranking jobs feel more autonomy to craft their job. It suggests that the level of the job and the level of autonomy does not necessarily influence the perceptions of employees to craft their job in the way that would be expect. It is about the perceived autonomy and degree of freedom to craft the job (Berg, Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2010). Although (almost) all research about job crafting focus on employees in general, Berg,
Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2010) made a distinction between supervisors and employees. Hence, this research suggest that both employees and supervisors craft their job (Berg, Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2010).
5 The result of job crafting is that employees experience changed task and relational boundaries in the job, which affects the work meaning and work identity of employees (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). The work meaning does not only influence job crafting, but changes as well because of job crafting (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). Job crafting influences the dynamics in relationships and which and how tasks are completed by the employees. Therefore, it is possible that job crafting has a great impact on the individual performance as well as the organizational performance (Berg et al., 2008). When organizational goals are in line with this job crafting, job crafting will have a positive impact on the individual and organizational performances and vice versa (Bakker & Xanthopoulou, 2009; Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). Besides, there are other positive outcomes of job crating. Job crafting will affect the job satisfaction, resilience, motivation, development performance of
employees (Tims & Bakker, 2010; Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001).
Job crafting and empowerment
The literature suggest that supervisors are facing difficulties into influence employees’ job crafting, since job crafting is a proactive behaviour of the employee without input from the supervisor (Lyons, 2008). However, while job crafting is an initiative from the employee, supervisors are seen as a
‘major contributor’ of employees’ job crafting (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). Supervisors may facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting. Therefore it should be likely that supervisors have an important role in employees’ job crafting (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001).
To craft the job, employees need a ‘degree of freedom’ given by the supervisor. An important contributor to this degree of freedom is the ‘managerial supervision’(Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001).
The more employees are controlled by their supervisor, the fewer degrees of freedom the employee has to craft the job (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001). Supervisors have been identified as the ‘drivers of change’ (Nielsen, 2013). Supervisors’ readiness for change influence employees’ readiness for change, which in turn is related to intervention outcomes. Supervisors are a role model for the behaviour of employees (Nielsen, 2013). The role of the supervisor influences the personal outcomes of employees in their job (O’discroll & Beehr, 1994). The empowering behaviour of the supervisor increases the degree to which the employee will experience motivation and participate in decision making (Cordery, Morrison, Wright & Wall, 2010). Hence the degree of freedom is related to empowerment. Empowerment is about examining the concepts of power and powerlessness.
Empowerment is a process where people gain control over their lives, important situations and where the control over their environment increases (Spreitzer, 1995). Empowerment can be derived into two general perspectives, the macro perspective and the micro perspective. The macro
perspective considers the different organizational empowering structures and policies (Liden & Arad,
6 1996). It is also known as structural empowerment. It focuses on the organizational and managerial practices in case of empowering employees at lower organizational levels. Practical examples are delegating decision-making to employees or giving employees responsibility to act on their own (Mills & Ungson, 2003).The micro perspective of empowerment refers to a specific form of intrinsic motivation of the employee (Liden & Arad, 1996). It is also known as psychological empowerment. In contrast to the structural empowerment, psychological empowerment focuses on the individual level and the individual experiences of empowerment. More practical, psychological empowerment is about what individuals’ needed feelings to become effective (Spreitzer, 1995). In case of the psychological empowerment, four dimensions can be divided: 1) meaning (value of work goal or purpose), 2) competence (employees’ believe in their own capacity), 3) self-determination (perception of autonomy) and 4) impact (perceived degree of influence). When an individual feels these dimensions of psychological empowerment he or she will become effective (Spreitzer, 1995).
By providing empowerment, supervisors can enlarge employees’ perceived degrees of freedom and can stimulate job crafting (Petrou, Demerouti & Breevaart, 2013). This confirms the role of the supervisor as a major contributor of employees’ job crafting and the statement that the fewer employees are controlled by their supervisor, the more degrees of freedom the employee has to craft (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). However supervisors may facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting, in the current literature the degree of this facilitation is seen as an established fact. Insight is lacking in the way managerial supervision in relation to job crafting gets established.
Job crafting and well-being
People craft their job to fulfil human needs and to improve their job satisfaction and well-being (Slemp & Vella-Brodrick, 2014). Well-being is defined as the presence of optimal (psychological) functioning and the optimal development of opportunities for participation and physical and mental health (Deci & Ryan, 2008; van der Klink et. al., 2011). The employee well-being is related to the employee sustainable employment (van der Klink et. al., 2011). For developing sustainable employment, organizations should keep their employees for a long time, should focus on healthy, defiant and significant jobs for their employees, should relate the employee with the organization by giving development opportunities and good management and should keep their employees satisfied with their job (Dorenbosch et. al., 2011).
Because of demographic trends and social and societal developments, sustainable employment and well-being of employees become more important (van der Klink et. al., 2011). The literature
identifies two different approaches of well-being. First, the hedonic approach, the subjective well-
7 being. This subjective well-being is about happiness, pleasure and ‘the good life’. Second, the
eudaimonic approach, the psychological well-being. This psychological well-being is about optimal functioning and self-actualisation (Slemp & Vella-Brodrick, 2014; Deci & Ryan, 2008). The level of well-being is determined by the extent to which the psychological needs are satisfied (Slemp & Vella- Brodrick, 2014). In case of the psychological needs, the Self-Determination Theory (SDT) “represents a broad framework for the study of human motivation and personality” and “their psychological needs” (Deci & Ryan, 2014). According to the SDT, the human nature has ‘inherent growth
tendencies’ (Deci & Ryan, 2000). Motivation determines mainly the manner and extent of people’s behaviour (Deci & Ryan, 2000). People act by external factors, extrinsic motivations, like evaluations, systems, opinions they think other people may have of them or bonuses. Thereby, people act by internal factors, intrinsic motivations, like values, curiosity or interests (Vansteenkiste & Ryan, 2013).
Besides, people have innate psychological needs. These three innate needs are identified as autonomy, competence and relatedness (Quinn & Dutton, 2005). Autonomy refers to volition, the need of self-organize experience and behaviour. Competence refers to the need of having an effect on the environment and attain valued outcomes within it. Relatedness refers to the need of feeling connected to others and to care and love (Deci & Ryan, 2000). The research of Slemp and Vella- Brodrick (2014) shows that the extent to which employees engage in job crafting predict the extent to which their psychological needs are satisfied, which, in turn, predict the level of employee psychological well-being and employee subjective well-being.
Research question and research model
The goal of this study is to provide insight into 1) supervisors’ own job crafting efforts, 2) the extent to which supervisors facilitate job crafting of their employees. The current literature shows that the role of the supervisor in job crafting seems to be lacking in job crafting research. Just the scholars Berg, Wrzesniewski & Dutton (2010) made a distinction between employees in high-ranking jobs and employees in low-ranking jobs and suggest that both employees and supervisors craft their job (Berg, Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2010). However, there is no additional research about supervisors’ job crafting. Besides, while job crafting is an initiative from employees, supervisors may facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting. In the current literature the degree of the facilitation is seen as an established fact. Insight is lacking in the way managerial supervision in relation to job crafting gets established.
8 To pursue the goal of this research the following research question is formulated:
How do supervisors craft their job and how facilitate supervisors employees’ job crafting?
The motivation to craft their job is more likely when employees perceive that opportunities for job crafting exist. Because of the managerial supervision, the supervisor is an important contributor to this degree of freedom or perceived opportunities for job crafting (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001).
What seems to be lacking in current research is how employees experience this facilitation.
Therefore, this research also provides insight in how employees experience supervisors’ facilitation or hinder of job crafting. The research of Slemp and Vella-Brodrick (2014) shows that the extent to which employees engage in job crafting predict the extent to which their psychological needs are satisfied, which, in turn, predict the level of employee psychological well-being and employee subjective well-being. Therefore it is interesting to provide insight into the relation between the psychological needs (autonomy, competence and relatedness) and supervisors’ facilitation and employees’ experience. Based on these premises a research model is developed:
Figure 1: research model job crafting, facilitate job crafting, experience and innate needs
The cube of the supervisor is the first step of this research, to provide insight into supervisors’ job crafting efforts. The second step is the arrow of facilitation, and provides insight into the extent of supervisors’ facilitation of employees’ job crafting. The results of supervisors’ job crafting efforts and the extent of supervisors’ facilitation will be compared. The cube of the employee is the fourth step, and provides insight into employees’ job crafting efforts. The fifth step is the arrow experience, and provides insight into how employees experience supervisors’ facilitation of employees’ job crafting.
The sixth step compares how supervisors facilitate employees’ job crafting with employees’
experience of this facilitation. Finally, the seventh step is to provide insight into the extent of the presence of the psychological needs (autonomy, competence and relatedness) in supervisors’
facilitation and employees’ experience.
Supervisor Employee
Facilitation
Experience
9
Method
In order to provide insight into supervisors’ and employees’ job crafting efforts and the extent to which supervisors facilitate employees’ job crafting, an explorative research design is used. An explorative research design explores the ‘how and why’ aspects by analysing descriptive data. To explore and deeper understand the occurrence, it is assumed that qualitative research methods an excellent choice (Baarda, de Goede & Teunissen, 2005).
Organizational context
The research was conducted amongst supervisors and employees in a Dutch waste management organization. Besides collecting garbage, the organization is specialized in sewage management, weed and rodent control and public space services. The organization emerged in 1997 as a result of the collaboration between several municipalities. Nowadays, the organization is owned by seven municipalities. Today, the organization focuses a lot on the physical and mental well-being of their supervisors and employees. In a period of a few years the organization reduced the absenteeism of their supervisors and employees by managing a physical health programme. In September 2013 the organization started the project group ‘sustainable employability’. The goal of this project group is to create a plan and instruments to increase the well-being and sustainable employability of the people in the organization. Job crafting can be an instrument to fulfil psychological needs and to increase the well-being of the people in this organization.
Participants
At the moment of starting the research, the waste management organization had three main locations. All participants were employing at one of these main locations. The organization has various departments. To gain a good reflection of the organization, participants of almost all
departments were selected, for example the director, the supervisor of the workplace, the supervisor financials and the truck driver. In cooperation with the coordinator human resources, 43 participants (supervisors and employees) were selected and invited to participate. All 43 invited supervisors and employees participated in this research. These 43 participants can be split up into 23 supervisors and 20 employees. There are 9 supervisors of the high-management and 14 supervisor of the middle- management. The final sample of 43 participants consists of 31 males and 12 females. Although this is a wide difference, it is a good reflection of the organization. Another wide difference is the number of years supervisors and employees work in this organization. It differs from 1 year to 17 years, since its’ inception. The supervisors and employees are working average 9.6 years in this organization, where supervisors work average 7 years and employees work average 12 years in this organization.
10 People craft their job to fulfil innate needs and to improve their job satisfaction. When employees feel that their needs are not met or fulfilled in their job, most often it will result in motivation to craft their job (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). Hence it is important to know how employees and
supervisors experience their job. Appendix 1 presents an overview of supervisors’ and employees’
job experience. The current job experience of both supervisors and employees is very positive. 74%
of the supervisors and 80% of the employees are very satisfied about their current job ”I am a happy person in this job. I am free to do what I want. I am very satisfied”. To improve their job satisfaction supervisors and employees want to develop themselves in their job, like to have a better allocation of tasks and especially want a better top-down communication in the organization “Only one month before starting collecting the plastic trash, the management told us about this new task. That is very late”. Thereby, employees would like to reduce their workload. Though, 48% of the supervisors and 50% of the employees see their future career at the current organization “I hope I still can do my job over 10 years. I love my job. If it is up to me, I will get my pension here”. Hence, while there are some improvements, supervisors and employees are very satisfied about their job and would like to stay working in this organization.
Data collection
In order to collect relevant data for this research two interview techniques are used: depth- interviewing and walking-along interviewing. Both are eminent techniques to provide data about attitudes, opinions, behaviours and knowledge (Baarda & de Goede, 1997; Carpiano, 2009). Usually with the walking-along interview the interviewer and participant will make a walk in the familiar neighbourhood of the participant. In this research the walking-along interview is used four times in the familiar work location of the participant, at the truck or sweeper machines of employees. The structure of both interview techniques are equally. For this research a semi-structured interview is used. The interview scheme is structured into 3 topics:
1. How employees and supervisors craft their job;
2. How and to what extent supervisors facilitate employees’ job crafting;
3. How employees experience supervisors’ facilitation of job crafting.
To provide insight into these three topics an interview protocol was developed. The main protocol questions were divided into five parts: the job experience, context crafting, task crafting, relational crafting and cognitive crafting. The interview protocol is added in this article as appendix 2a
‘interview scheme supervisors’ and appendix 2b ‘interview scheme employees’.
11 In four weeks 23 supervisors were selected and invited to participate. The 23 supervisors were interviewed at their work location during working hours. For all 23 interviews the depth-interview technique is used. Before starting the interview, the interviewer introduced herself and gave a short definition about job crafting and a short introduction about the goal and structure of the research.
The interviewer emphasized that the results of the interview will be treated confidentially and asked for permission to use a voice-recorder. All 23 participants agreed with it. The interviewer attempted to keep the interview informal, so the participant feels more comfortable (Baarda & de Goede, 1997). The interviewer was careful to pose the questions in a general way, to generate a description and examples of how the supervisors craft their job. Regularly participants needed more clarification, so the interviewer gave examples of job crafting. When a participant mentioned a situation of
possible job crafting, the interviewer posed follow-up questions. So, each mention of job crafting was used to ask more follow-up questions, what resulted into circles (Berg et. al., 2010). The length of the interviews was between 52 minutes and 1.16 hours.
During a following four weeks, 20 employees were selected and invited to participate and all agreed to participate in the interviews. In case of 16 interviews, the depth-interview technique is used, including the same interview process as mentioned above. In case of 4 interviews the walking-along interview technique is used (Carpiano, 2009). The interviewer ‘walked along’ with the employee during a half work day. This meant that that the interviewer drove with 4 participants for half a day.
In two cases, employees didn’t agree with recording the interview. Therefore the interviewer wrote down the quotes of the participants. The length of the interviews were between the 38 and 57 minutes.
Data analysis
To manage and analyse all interview data, several steps are taken. First all recordings of the depth- interviews and walking-along interviews were listened and fully transcribed. For each separate interview relevant quotes were selected into craft their own job, facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting (for supervisors) and experience supervisors’ facilitation (employees). After selecting the relevant quotes of the supervisors and employees the data could be analysed.
Supervisors’ job crafting
The quotes of the supervisors about crafting their own job were categorized into the four forms of job crafting: context crafting, task crafting, relational crafting and cognitive crafting. Besides, a distinction is made between job crafting and management crafting. Management crafting is crafting specific for a supervisor, what is not possible for an employee. In case of each crafting form the
12 quotes were labelled into one of the 16 job crafting techniques introduced by van Vuuren and
Dorenbosch (2011) or into an invented label. The crafting type context crafting is divided into the labels rebuild, decorate, distraction, move and ease. Task crafting is divided into enrich tasks, push off/exchange tasks, workload, share/rotate tasks and self-improvement. Relational crafting is divided into build relations, avoidance, trust and approach. Cognitive crafting, is divided into reinterpret and extol. For some labels, sub-labels were created to get a more concrete analysis. Examples are positive, negative, business, private, to-do-lists or working at home during working hours. In case of every (sub-)label, the number of supervisors whose quotes were related to this (sub-)label is counted. In the results section Table 1 presents an overview of the four crafting forms, the (sub- )labels, the number of supervisors related to this (sub-label) and one quote as a practical example.
Supervisors’ facilitation of employees’ job crafting
To make it possible for employees to craft their job, employees need degrees of freedom given by their supervisors (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001). After a thoroughly selection and analysis of the quotes of supervisors about facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting, it became clear that the degrees of freedom given by the supervisors can be positive as well as negative. Finally, four types of degrees of freedom given by supervisors are identified: invite, allow, discourage and block. Invite and allow are positive, discourage and block are negative. The selected quotes are placed into these four facilitation types and then into the four forms of job crafting. The facilitating type invite is about how supervisors invite their employees to craft. The crafting types context, task, relational and cognitive are present. In the facilitating type allow, the crafting types context, task and relational are present and cognitive is not. The facilitation type discourage is about how supervisors discourage employees to craft. The crafting types context, task and relational are present. Finally, the last facilitation type is block, where supervisors block job crafting of employees. The crafting types context, task and relational are present. Thereafter the quotes are (sub-)labelled. For every (sub-)label in every facilitation type the related supervisors are counted. In the results section Table 2 presents an overview of the four facilitation types, the four crafting forms, the (sub-)labels and the number of supervisors related to this (sub-)label and one quote.
Job crafting by employees
The quotes of the employees about crafting their own job were categorized into the four forms of job crafting, labelled and sub-labelled as well. The crafting type context crafting is divided into the labels rebuild, decorate, distraction, move and ease. The crafting type task crafting is divided into enrich tasks, push off/exchange tasks, workload, share/rotate tasks and self-improvement. The crafting type relational crafting is divided into build relations, avoidance, trust and approach. The last
13 crafting type, cognitive crafting, is divided into reinterpret and extol. In case of every (sub-)label, the number of employees whose quotes were related to this (sub-)label was counted. Table 3 in the results section presents an overview of the four crafting forms, the (sub-)labels, the number of employees related to this (sub-label) and one quote as a practical example.
Employees’ experience of supervisors facilitation of job crafting
The quotes of employees’ experience are selected and categorized into the four forms of job crafting and labelled as well. The selected quotes of employees’ experience are placed into the four
facilitation types invite, allow, discourage and block, selected into the four forms of job crafting and (sub-)labelled as well to get a concrete analysis. The facilitating type invite is about how employees experience an invitation given by the supervisors to craft their job. The crafting types context, task, relational and cognitive are present. In the facilitating type allow the crafting types context, task and relational are present and cognitive is not. The facilitation type discourage is about employees’
feeling that supervisors discourage them to craft. The crafting types context, task and relational are present. Finally, the last facilitation type is block, where employees experience that supervisors block the opportunity to craft. The crafting types context, task and relational are present. For every (sub- )label in every facilitation type the related number of employees are counted. Table 4 in the results section presents an overview of the four facilitation types, the four crafting forms, the (sub-)labels and the number of employees related to this (sub-)label and one quote.
Job crafting and innate needs (autonomy, competence, relatedness)
To explore in which way job crafting is related to the well-being of supervisors and employees, the self-determination theory is used as starting point. The SDT is a broad and important theory of motivation. Quinn & Dutton (2005) used the innate needs, autonomy, competence and relatedness in their study about energy and cooperation. Hereby, they related the innate needs with the quotes of participant (Quinn & Dutton, 2005). In this study, the innate needs are related to the opinions of the supervisors and employees. Quinn and Dutton (2005) made a distinction between quotes which increased the innate need and thus the energy and quotes which decrease the innate need and thus the energy. In this study this distinction is made as well. For the supervisors and employees, the number of the innate needs (positive and negative) are counted per label. Each quote of the supervisor about facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting and each quote of employees about experience this facilitation is labelled to one of these innate needs. Thereafter is counted how frequently the three innate needs were present at the four forms of job crafting. In the results section Table 5 shows an overview of this analysis.
14
Results
In this section the findings of this research will be presented. First, the most relevant results of supervisors’ job crafting and supervisors extent of facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting will be outlined. Thereafter these results will be compared, to provide insight in the relation between crafting the job and facilitating job crafting. Second, the most relevant results of employees’ job crafting and employees’ experience of the facilitation given by the supervisor will be outlined. Third, the results of supervisors’ facilitation of job crafting and the results of employees’ experience of this facilitation will be compared, to get insight in similarities or differences. Finally, the results of the relation between job crafting and the innate needs autonomy, competence and relatedness will be presented.
Figure 2: research model job crafting, facilitate job crafting and experience this facilitation.
Supervisors
This section presents the results of how supervisors craft their job, how they facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting and the results of a possible relation between supervisors’ job crafting and supervisors’ facilitation.
Job crafting by supervisors
The results of the analysis about how supervisors craft their own job will be outlined in this section.
These results are presented in Table 1. The most relevant results will be singled out and discussed.
Figure 3: job crafting model: job crafting by employees
S E
Experienc e
Experienc e
E S
Crafting
type Label Sub-label Number Quote
Context Rebuild business 12 I set a closet into my office by myself. I did it by myself.
private 1 At home I am rebuilding my study room, to make it more comfortable to work here in the evening.
Decorate business 5 A very ugly plant was standing in my office. I took or stole a more beautiful plant from this building and set it in my office.
personal 10 I spend more time here than at home. So I like to create a sense of home. Put some stuff at the wall. Create a comfortable workplace.
Distraction 2 I have a radio in my office. I like some distraction sometimes.
Move
working at home during working
hours 14 What I can finish in one afternoon at home, I will use 2 full days at the office. Therefore I work at home sometimes.
working at home outside working
hours 15 As a supervisor, I have lots of meetings. To write or finish documents I work in the evenings or weekends.
Ease To-do-lists 7 I have made schedules with processes for the department, including task lists.
digitizing 3 I try to digitize documents more and more. My closet has been halved. I think I can work without papers.
purchase tools by the employer 4 I don't like it to write down addresses. Therefore, I wanted a label printer. I ordered it by myself for the department.
Task
crafting Enrich tasks additional functions 4 I am a board member of the employee association
within the job 2
Last year I devised a plan to improve the tasks we do, which was well received by the supervisors. I did some experiments, just because I think it is important to improve ourselves.
Push off / exchange
tasks negative 5 In the beginning, I wanted to do everything by myself. But then I realized, that's not feasible. Nowadays, I have less tasks.
Managerial
crafting 9 I merged some departments. I had to push off some tasks in order to manage these departments in a good way.
positive 2 Once a month I work with the guys in the field, behind the truck.
Workload minimize wordload (negative) 5 My tasks are divided because I worked 60 or 70 hours a week. I didn't want this anymore. It was way too much.
managerial
crafting 2 My workload was too much. I gave the planning to an employee.
16
maximize workload (positive) 3 During the time, you take more and more. And finally, you are always bussy and stressed.
Share /
rotate tasks with other departments 1 I have merged two departments to one department, which is managed by me. So, now I'm sharing tasks with other people.
managerial
crafting 1
The stockroom and the workroom are two different departments. But often, we do tasks for each other. So the boundary between the departments fades sometimes a bit.
within department 2 We try to share tasks, so we can take over tasks if it is necessary
self-improvement 6 I'm changed. I have developed myself more. Now, I have more helecopter view.
Relational build
relations personal 3 I have a very good relationship with one colleague. Sometimes we are going out at night, for a dinner.
managerial
crafting 1
I invite the people of the winter service for a barbecue in my garden. I'd like to thank them and share some personal things from me with them.
business 6
For a long time, I had a very bad relationship with a colleague. However, we had to work together. Now, I'm visiting him regularly. Just to create a pleasant work relationship.
avoidance 8
You never know for how long a new one is here. Half a year, two years? Because of many rotations of people, I don't invest in relationships.
Trust positive 2 I trust some people at the office. I can tell them personal things.
negative 3 My relationship with the managing board deteriorated. It was all about trust. In my case, I couldn't trust it anymore.
approach 5 men differ a lot from women. As a woman, I really had to get used to the men culture.
Cognitive reinterpret 7 In the beginning, the complexity of this organization overwhelmed me. But now I see it more as a challenge.
extol 1 I didn't like this tasks, but I have to do it. First, I thought it is an awful task. Now I think, well, it is still awful but very important too.
Table 1: job crafting by supervisors
Context crafting
Supervisors craft their context by using distraction and in particular by rebuild and decorate their workplace, move to a different workplace or ease their work with different tools. Supervisors craft their workplace by rebuilding it, like removing a desk, place a closet or remove a wall: “Before, the office was much smaller. We initiated and arranged to remove the wall, to create more space in our office”. Supervisors decorate their workplace with work-related things and decorate their workplace with personal things, like photos or poster, to feel more comfortable “In my office, a shirt of a specific football club is hanging on the wall. In this building it was full of stuff of a different football club”. Besides, supervisors sometimes move to another workplace. Supervisors work at home during working hours, because it is more quiet and they can do more work “When I have to write large documents, or have to finish something, I work at home”. And they mention to work at home in their spare time, for example after work or in the weekend, to finish work tasks “regularly, I work at home on a Saturday afternoon. To finish things what I can't finish at the office”. To make their job easier, supervisors use to-do-lists, purchase tools or digitize documents “I always use my to-do-list.
Otherwise I will forget things”.
Task crafting
Supervisors craft their tasks by share and rotate tasks with their own and other departments and in particular by enrich tasks, push off or exchange tasks, minimize the workload and improve
themselves. Supervisors like to do more tasks or think it is important to do that. Hence supervisors enrich their tasks by adding tasks besides their job or adding tasks within their job “officially it is not my task, but I took this mentor role to myself”. Besides enrich tasks, supervisors push off and
exchange tasks. In particular this is typically management crafting, because supervisors push tasks off and give it to their employees “I had to push off these tasks and give it to my employees. I didn’t want to do it anymore”. Because supervisors feel they worked too much hours, need more space to breath or want to be more healthy, supervisors reduce their workload “I try to work more efficient. Do not all the things but only the important things. Otherwise I will drowning”. Finally, supervisors improved and developed themselves, by craft tasks like collecting knowledge, learning new things or become more strategic “I improved myself by doing things more systematically and study things more”.
Relational crafting
Supervisors craft their relations by trust their colleagues less or more, use a different approach to their colleagues and in particular build relationships with colleagues and avoid colleagues.
Supervisors build their relation with colleagues at a personal level to feel more comfortable as well as at a business level “I will join trips with my department, I think that is important for the relationship
18 with colleagues”. Besides getting closer with colleagues, supervisors avoid colleagues as well.
Supervisors avoid colleagues to avoid negative faces, not being influenced negatively or they just don’t invest in relationships because of plenty rotations of colleagues “I had to take a very unpopular measure. During a few weeks, I started my workdays half an hour later. Just to avoid the angry faces of the people”.
Cognitive crafting
Supervisors craft their cognition by extol their thoughts about their job and in particular to
reinterpret their thoughts about their job. Supervisors reinterpret their job to create a more positive job for them, for example from an overwhelming job to a job with challenges, or to see it less as my company “Before, I saw this as my company. Now, I try to see it less as my company, because it isn't. I do my job, that's it”.
In case of push off/ exchange tasks, workload, share / rotate tasks and build relations some job crafting examples are specific for supervisors. Employees cannot craft their job in this way. These are mentioned as ‘managerial crafting’. The efforts supervisors make to craft their context are
particularly rebuild and decorate the workplace, work at home during and after working hours and use tools to ease their job. In case of task crafting, the efforts of the supervisor are enrich task, push off tasks, minimize workload and self-improvement. Besides, supervisors build on personal and business relationships and avoid colleagues are the main efforts to craft their relations. Finally, the effort supervisors make to craft their cognition is particularly reinterpret their thoughts about their job. Hence these results present that supervisors craft the context, their tasks, relations and cognition of their job.
How supervisors facilitate employees’ job crafting
In this section the results of how supervisors facilitate or hinder the opportunity for employees’ job crafting is presented in this section. Although this is a very interesting and important part of job crafting, yet there are no studies about it. The results of supervisors’ facilitation are presented in Table 2. Only the most relevant results will be discussed.
Figure 3: model job crafting: supervisors’ facilitation
S
Experienc e
E
faciliatiting type
crafting
type label Number Quotes
Invite Context Move 3 employees work more at home. I think I stimulate this a bit.
Ease 1 I saw the employees struggle. I asked then, why don't you buy a water vacuum. That's much easier.
work clothes 1 the men outside have the best work clothes, but never it's good enough. Therefore we have a consultation to talk about it and look for improvements.
Task self improvement 5 I try to develop my employees. I stimulate it, that people improve themselves.
change / share /
rotate tasks 12 The guys of the sweepers had influence on how they wanted their job. They got the opportunity to change things, they liked that.
enrich tasks 3 An employee had the idea to improve our 'road map'. Please, go ahead! I gave her time to do this.
minimize workload 1 I try to get more understanding for the importance of workload. And that it's important to deal with it in an right way. To minimize it.
Relational build relations 4 I tried to promote the relationship between supervisor and employee. It's difficult. I'd like to see more connection.
coping with 4 If two employees have an issue with each other, I invite them for coffee and try to let them solve the issues by themselves.
Cognitive extol 3 We are proud at the company, and the employees are more proud at the company too. I try to communicate this positiveness to them.
reinterpret 5 I give my employees responsibility and lots of opportunities. I hope they will think more positive about their job.
Allow Context Rebuild 3 When I rebuild my office, why shouldn't the employees be allowed to rebuild their office or truck. Ofcourse, not to much.
Decorate 8 Someone has a radio, or photos of his children at his desk, or some paintings on the wall. That's fine for me, if it makes them more comfortable.
Move 3 If they want to finish a document and they want to do it at home, fine. They only have to tell me that the'll work that day at home.
Ease 5 An employee wanted a microphone, because it's more easier to talk with costumers then. Fine, a microphone can be installed.
Task Enrich tasks 3 someone at my department is taking the leader role. He isn't the leader, but he act like one. I like it when someone's taking the lead.
Change / share /
rotate tasks 10 my employees don't have to ask me if something is okay. I want to see good final results. How they accomplish these results, it's up to them.
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Relational Build relations 4 Because of the issues with the managing board, I saw that some employees were more close. I think that's a good thing, in difficult times.
avoid 5 Some people take some distance from each other. When this is more comfortable for them, it's okay.
collaborate 2 when a truck finished picking up the garbage, he will always help his colleague to finish. I like that so much.
Discourage Context decorate 5 I don't forbid personal stuff in the truck, but I don't stimulate it either. I always tell them, it has to be a comfortable place for everyone.
Move 1 My employees have the opportunity to work at home, but I discourage it. I prefer to have some control.
Task
change / share /
rotate tasks 3 I have to decide and make a base, otherwise they do things wrong.
Relational Build relations 1 there is a group of four people, they are dominant. So sometimes, you have to break down their time together.
avoid 1 Some people try to avoid others. I try to discourage this, yes.
coping with 1 Sometimes, I interfere with a conflict. I take the lead to solve the conflict, not the employees.
Block Context decorate 3 I removed one thing from my colleague. I didn't like what he put on the wall.
ease 1 Some drivers want a smartphone, but we will not give a smartphone to them.
working clothes 3 If they do not wear working clothes, they will get a warning.
Task enrich tasks 1 Doing more or new tasks is not always a good idea. So, sometimes I have to limit their freedom to do this.
change / share /
rotate tasks 2 You have to do some tasks in that way. It is not about you can change it because you dislike it. It’s about what is good for the organization.
Relational Build relations 2 Sometimes it's necessary to isolate the people who not function very well. That helps them.
avoid 2 When a person tells he doesn't want to work with him, it doesn't bother me. They can't avoid each other. So I will put them on a truck together.
collaborate 1 If you have 2 negative persons together, sometimes it will be bether to stop that collaboration and roulade. That will be better for the whole group.
Gossip 4 Gossiping is forbidden. I really forbid my employees to gossip.
Table 2: supervisors’ facilitation or hinder of employees’ job crafting
Invite
Supervisors invite employees to craft the context, tasks, relations and cognition in the job. In case of context crafting, supervisors suggest that they invite employees to move to a different workplace
“when I notice that it's difficult for an employee to focus here, I say, you can go home and do your work there. If you like it”. In case of task crafting, supervisors invite employees to improve
themselves, to change or share tasks with colleagues and to minimize the workload. Supervisors think it is important that employee have the opportunity and the willing to improve themselves
“First, he didn't want to do the study. But I wanted it, just for himself, so I tried to convince him. Now he starts his second study!” Besides, supervisors invite employees to change and share tasks with colleagues, because this is important for employees’ well-being “I stimulated to share more tasks, because it's important. Now, they'll do this much more by themselves. That’s not good for their well- being”. In case of relational crafting, supervisors are less active to invite employees to craft their job.
Supervisors invite employees to build relations with colleagues and to cope with issues. Supervisors invite employees to build relations in their job, because employees will feel more comfortable
“Because of the history, a few employees were suspicious. I have organized some things with our department to create relationships and improve these relationships”. Supervisors think it is important for employees to cope with issues and to invite them to do so “Sometimes there are struggles. I will put the people together, so they have to talk with each other and solve their struggles”. In case of cognitive crafting, supervisors invite employees to extol their job and to reinterpret their job “I try to make them aware of the importance of recycling possibilities, commodities. I hope they'll see their job as important for the whole world”.
Allow
Supervisors allow that employees craft the context, tasks, relations and cognition of the job. In case of context crafting, supervisors mention that they allow employees to rebuild and decorate their workplace, move to another workplace and ease their job. Most frequently, supervisors allow employees to decorate and to ease their job “If there is some personal stuff in the truck, that's fine.
But it has not to become a funfair”. In case of task crafting, supervisors suggest that they allow the possibility to enrich tasks and share/rotate tasks. Supervisors allow employees to share/rotate tasks because they think it is important to give employees this freedom and responsibility “I think, when you'll create openness and give people responsibility, they will function in a good way. If they want to change things in their jobs, fine”. In case of relational crafting, supervisors allow employees to build relations, avoid colleagues and collaborate. Supervisors allow employees to build relations with colleagues, but avoid colleagues as well because it is up to them how they maintain their
22 relationships “If people avoid each other, and is not irritating other employees, or it's not at the escalating level, then I will let it go”.
Discourage
In case of context crafting, supervisors discourage employees to decorate their workplace to keep the workplace professional and ordered “A sweeper shouldn't be a lightning Christmas tree. When I think it is, I ask them to remove it”. In case of task crafting supervisors discourage employees to share/rotate tasks, because they think this is not the right choice for the employee or the
organization “To finish the tasks, it's important to follow right steps. Sometimes, they want to change those steps. Then I tell them I don't like that, so they will follow the right direction”. In case of
relational crafting, supervisors are not very active in discourage employees’ job crafting.
Block
In case of context crafting supervisors block employees to decorate the workplace and to change their work clothes “Some drivers take their sweater off, however it's required to wear them. I don't tolerate that at all”. Supervisors do not block employees’ task crafting frequently. Two supervisors mentioned that they block the possibility to share/rotate tasks “Sometimes I say, it's not possible, the way you want it. It's about how the organization wants it”. Supervisors block employees’ opportunity to craft their relations not frequently. Blocking the opportunity to gossip is blocked the most in order to maintain a good ambiance “I don't tolerate gossiping at all. If I notice it, I will stop it immediately”.
Concluding, supervisors invite and allow employees most frequently to change and share tasks with colleagues and supervisors allow employees most frequently to decorate their workplace. Though, supervisors discourage employees to decorate their workplace most frequently as well. Besides, supervisors block gossiping by employees most frequently. Hence supervisors both facilitate and hinder employees’ job crafting. Yet there is a difference in the frequency of facilitate or hinder employees’ job crafting. Supervisors are more active in facilitate (invite and allow) employees to craft their job than hinder (discourage and block).
Supervisors’ job crafting vs. supervisors’ facilitation of employees’ job crafting
This section will provide insight into the relation between supervisors’ job crafting and supervisors’
facilitation of employees’ job crafting. When a supervisors craft his or her own job, does the supervisor facilitate the opportunity for employees to craft their job as well and vice versa?
